Style rating Like most PDF files, this product is just formatted pages with accompanying B&W line art. The art often, but not consistently, has something to do with a power on the page. It’s neither a knockout nor difficult to read. I’d give it a 2 for style if I were comparing it to a printed product you might buy down at the local game store.
Substance rating This supplement contains rules for additional powers compatible with Mutants and Masterminds (M&M) from Green Ronin. In general, I found the powers broke down into four informal categories. I thought of them as examples, fun powers, villain powers, and bad ideas.
Examples There are several powers which are more or less examples of how to use the rules on pages 92-99 of the M&M rulebook to build a power from scratch. Much like Hero Games’s ECs, they allow control of a range of linked effects: atomic control, friction control, light control, and reality control each allow a spread of effects and are very expensive. I think they are excellent “packages” to present to players who were not fond of the math requirements of Hero. Swarm, an ability to break into a …well… swarm of creatures was a nice alternate for the alternate form – semisolid from the main rules. These were especially useful for me to read over because there are not a large number of examples in the main rulebook.
Fun powers This is strictly subjective, of course, but most of the powers went into this category for me. Some were things useful in a superhero universe, but most were strictly frosting but fun additions. For example, confession burn makes the victim suffer in proportion to the evil they have done. (Ghost Rider fans start scribbling here.) Solid step allows your hero to walk on water or mist. Peaceful aura allows you to have a hero who naturally dampens violent impulses, a neat twist on a very limited control power. Dimensional doppelganger allows your hero to summon almost-twins ala temporal fugue, but since these are near-parallel dimension alternates you have a slight variation in aid and occasionally you get an evil twin by mistake.
Villain powers Some of the powers struck me as powers I would never allow a player to take but ones that made sense for certain villains. Addictive metabolism, which causes others to become addicted to your character, is a great vampire power but could cause enormous trouble in the hands of the wrong player. Command explains why all those ninjas, hydra agents, and Fu Manchu dacoits fight to the end even when they’re clearly outclassed. Their leader has a power that instills fanaticism.
Bad ideas Into each life, a little rain must fall. There were some powers here that I thought were bad ideas. Some seemed undertested, others undercosted, and two or three were downright extraneous. Stage magic crosses the line into skill territory, effectively taking over for the skills and allowing undetectable hiding of objects. Ability shift gives twice the flexibility of boost with no time limit on the effect for the same price. Blindsight (a new power, not the already existing feat) adds an extra set of rolls and makes the feat completely useless. In general, I found that these powers were just too (twinky, munchkin, Mickey Mouse) for me, and I’d cut them out. On the other hand, it’s easy enough to put limits or bans on your campaign, and even some of the powers I disliked made me think about other methods that I would have found acceptable.
Overall If this were a printed format down at your local, I’d recommend M&M players and GMs pick it up for the good examples if it were $10 or so. I’d recommend other superhero games players pay no more than $5. Since it’s a $5 download, if you can stand the electronic nature of the product, I’d say go for it.
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